


Don't Hurry Home

by IsEmilyReal



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Major character death - Freeform, Oneshot, dealing with grief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-18
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-05-25 01:40:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14966366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IsEmilyReal/pseuds/IsEmilyReal
Summary: Fire tore through his throat. He picked up the vase and, with a scream, threw it into the wall. It shattered into a million pieces, the fragments landing on top of the broken vase from three nights before.





	Don't Hurry Home

Phil opened the door to their flat, the one they had lived in for only a year. A vase of flowers sat on the living room table. Rage swelled inside him, not for the first time that day. He didn’t need these people’s goddamn sympathy. He didn’t need their pitying looks and “I’m so sorry”s. He didn’t need them to walk on eggshells around him, afraid to say something that would send him into another fit.

He stalked over and ripped the card out of the flowers, shaking petals free in the process. He read the bullshit written inside, something from Dan’s aunt and uncle about how he was the best thing to happen to their family and how they would be around if Phil needed them. Fire tore through his throat. He picked up the vase and, with a scream, threw it into the wall. It shattered into a million pieces, the fragments landing on top of the broken vase from three nights before.

Fuck them! They never accepted Dan for who he was! They didn’t hold him while he cried and listen to him scream and appreciate all his smiles. They didn’t love him the way he deserved, and now they were offering their sympathy when they had caused so much of his grief! He didn’t need them! He didn’t need any of them!

He needed Dan.

Sobs tore from his throat. It was only supposed to be a day trip to visit his parents. He took the trip alone, because Phil had some meeting he didn’t even pay attention to to go to. It was an hour long train ride home. He texted Phil at three in the afternoon, saying he was coming home early with a surprise.

He didn’t make it home. Hell, he hardly made it out of Reading before the train derailed and took the lives of him and 63 other people.

Cold. Phil was so cold, so numb, so _ alone. _ Never in his life had he been so alone. He felt cold during the funeral as he watched his mother cry for the loss of her third son and Dan’s cry for the loss of her first. He felt cold while Adrian pummeled his chest, crying and cursing him for being the reason Dan took that train in the first place. He felt cold sleeping alone on the couch, because he couldn’t stand sleeping in the bed they had shared. 

The only warmth he had was anger, and it was so fleeting. It escaped him when he needed it most, to drive the cold away, to help him feel something, anything. He needed it to deal with the thought that Dan was well and truly gone, and he wouldn’t be coming back, no matter how much Phil wanted him to.

“I may not be coming back,” a familiar drawl sounded behind him, “but I’m not  _ gone _ , Phil.” He spun so fast he made himself dizzy. There, in the doorway to the kitchen, stood Dan, dressed in the oversized striped sweater and ripped jeans he had loved so much. 

Phil thought he was going to faint. “You…” he whispered. “You’re not real.” Dan gave him a smile, as if to say  _ don’t you know anything? _ , and he felt like puking. He shut his eyes tight, wishing the torture would stop so he could be left to cry in peace.

“Philip Michael Lester, you look at me this instant.” It was a tone he’d never heard Dan take before. His eyes popped open, hot tears rolling down his cheeks. Dan stood with his hands on his hips, clearly exasperated. “You have got to stop this… this  _ foolishness _ . Where’s your phone?” he demanded, but Phil couldn’t tell him. “When was the last time you ate?” Phil couldn’t tell him that, either. “You haven’t slept in a real bed in two weeks. Quit being ridiculous.”

“You’re gone,” Phil answered. It was all he could manage before the wrath consumed him like a tree in a wildfire. “You left me, Dan. You left me here in this shitty grey universe that never cared what happened to us. You left before I could tell you I love you.”

“The last thing you told me was that you loved me,” Dan said, but he was too angry to care.

“We never bought a house or became dog parents. We never got to be uncles.” Dan gave him a startled look. “That’s right,” he said, well, shouted, really. “Cornelia and Martyn told me today that they’re gonna have a baby boy. They’re naming him after  _ you _ , Dan, and you won’t even be here to meet him.” His jaw was quivering, and Dan was blurry through the tears, but he couldn’t stop. “We never got to go on the world tour we wanted to take. We never got to get married on the beach if Brighton like you wanted. We never got to tell the fans that most of what they suspected was true, that we were in love a-and had plans and-”

A soft voice interrupted his rant. “You have to tell them, Phil, the whole truth. You owe them that much.”

“I can’t. I won’t,” his voice broke, “not without you.”

“You can and you will. You  _ need _ them. Without them, you’ll come home long before your time. And you’re not gonna be without me, silly.” Dan’s soft grin warmed his chest. He took a few steps forward, until they were just inches apart. “Whenever you want me, all you have to do is remember.” He placed a gentle kiss on Phil’s forehead. “I have to go. Don’t hurry home.”

As warm arms wrapped around him, Phil asked, “Are you really home?”

“I am,” Dan said, holding him softly. After a moment, he kissed Phil gingerly and let him go. “Someday you will be, too. I’ll always love you.”

He began to fade away. “I love you so much,” Phil said through tears. Dan laughed, filling his heart with music, before finally disappearing.

Phil staggered, utterly exhausted. He stumbled through the house, just barely changed into pajamas, and fell into his bed,  _ their _ bed, fast asleep.

He woke around noon and stumbled towards the kitchen in search of coffee. Before he could get there, he slipped on a piece of paper in front of the front door. From the ground, he inspected it and found soft, loopy handwriting.

_ He may be gone, child, but he’s not gone forever. You’ll see him again. _

_ -Miss Carol _

Miss Carol, their next-door neighbor, had been alone for as long as they lived their. They didn’t talk to her much, but when they did, she was always sweet, despite her hearing too much of their private lives.

Phil got up and opened the door. Right outside sat a box of cupcakes, chocolate with vanilla frosting, the kind that always showed up whenever they argued a little too loudly. Miss Carol never admitted to making them, but they had mended plenty of sore hearts just when Dan and Phil needed it the most.

And two decades later, after he succumbed to a heart defect in his sleep, Miss Carol led him along that shiny road to a small house surrounded by a beautiful garden. She waved him in. 

Dan stood in the middle of their dream house, a small golden band adorning his left hand and another held in his right. When he stepped through the door, he felt himself become young again, morphing back into the person he was before Dan left him. Phil walked into his embrace, feeling finally at peace.

At last they drew apart. Dan slid the gold band onto Phil’s finger and whispered, “You’re home, Phil.”

He felt a grin spread across his lips. “I know.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry.   
> You can find me on Tumblr as dans-finger-guns.


End file.
